Bioengineering and Medical Informatics degree
programmes in the West Balkans
Executive Summary
BioEMIS is a European Commission Tempus project to develop new study programmes in
Bioengineering and Medical Informatics at universities in the West Balkans. This report
summarises the work undertaken in work package 1.2 to analysis the Bioengineering and
Medical Informatics degree programmes at universities in the West Balkans.
2
Acknowledgments
This study is supported by TEMPUS project 530417-TEMPUS-1-2012-1-UK-TEMPUSJPCR.
3
Table of Contents
1.
Introduction .................................................................................................................... 5
2.
Bosnia and Herzegovina ................................................................................................ 5
3.
4.
2.1
Introduction ............................................................................................................. 5
2.2
Faculties of medicine/health studies/pharmacy. ...................................................... 6
2.3
Faculties of mechanical engineering/electrical engineering/computer sciences ....... 6
Montenegro .................................................................................................................... 9
3.1
State of BE and MI education in Montenegro .......................................................... 9
3.2
Development of the rehabilitation engineering ........................................................10
3.2
Development of Medical Robotics and Biomechanical systems .............................10
3.3
Development of MI, E-Health and Telemedicine.....................................................10
3.4
Development of Medical Electronics and Medical Instrumentation .........................11
3.5
Educational modules and courses from fields of BE and MI ...................................12
3.6
Summary on BE and MI educational modules in Montenegro and conclusions ......12
Serbia............................................................................................................................14
4.1
Introduction ............................................................................................................14
4.2
Center of Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Studies and Research ..................15
4.3
State of the Art .......................................................................................................16
4.4
The Latest Developments ......................................................................................16
4
1.
Introduction
BioEMIS is a European Commission Tempus project to develop new study programmes in
Bioengineering and Medical Informatics (BE&MI) at universities in the West Balkans (WB).
This report summarises the work undertaken in work package 1.2 to analysis the current
Bioengineering and Medical Informatics degree programmes at universities in the WB,
namely in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia
2.
Bosnia and Herzegovina
2.1
Introduction
In Bosnia and Herzegovina there is no study program in biomedical engineering or medical
informatics. Also, an organized society on biomedical/biological engineering has not yet been
established. Analysis of study programs and courses in biomedical engineering and medical
informatics in Bosnia and Herzegovina included 20 public faculties at 8 universities: 5
faculties of medicine, 4 faculties of health studies, 1 faculty of pharmacy, 6 faculties of
mechanical engineering, 2 faculties of electrical engineering, 2 faculties of computer
sciences (Table 1).
Table 1. Analyzed faculties in Bosnia and Herzegovina
City
University
Sarajevo
University
Faculty
Webpage
of Faculty of Health Studies
Sarajevo
Faculty
of
http://www.fzs.unsa.ba
Mechanical http://www.mef.unsa.ba/
Engineering
Faculty of Medicine
University
of Faculty
East Sarajevo
of
http://www.mf.unsa.ba
Electrical http://www.etf.unssa.rs.ba
Engineering
Faculty
of
Mechanical http://www.maf1.unssa.rs.ba
Engineering
Faculty of Medicine
Banja Luka
University
Banja Luka
of Faculty
of
http://www.mf-foca.rs.ba
Electrical http://etf.unibl.org
Engineering
Faculty
of
Mechanical http://mf.unibl.org
Engineering
Faculty of Medicine
Mostar
University
Mostar
of Faculty of Health Studies
Faculty of Medicine
Faculty
of
http://med.unibl.org
http://fzs.sve-mo.ba
http://www.mefmo.ba
Mechanical www.fsr.ba
Engineering and Computing
5
Džemal Bijedić Faculty
University
of
Information http://www.fit.ba
Technologies
Faculty
of
Mechanical http://www.mf.unmo.ba
Engineering
Tuzla
University
Tuzla
of Faculty of Pharmacy
Faculty
of
http://www.farmacy.untz.ba
Mechanical http://www.mf.untz.ba
Engineering
Faculty of Medicine
Zenica
University
http://www.medf.untz.ba
of Faculty of Health
http://www.zf.unze.ba
of College of Nursing Studies
http://www.vzs.unbi.ba
Zenica
Bihać
University
Bihać
Faculty
of
Technical http://www.tfb.ba
Engineering
2.2
Faculties of medicine/health studies/pharmacy.
In the analyzed faculties there is no study program in biomedical engineering/medical
informatics leading to a university degree. In all of these faculties there are some
undergraduate/graduate/postgraduate courses, which are necessary for education in
biomedicine. Most of them are mandatory for individual study programs. We classified
courses in two groups: biomedical engineering courses and medical informatics courses.
Courses in biomedical engineering in these faculties are: biophysics, biomechanics,
prosthetics and orthotics, radiology equipment, radiation physics and electronics, new
computer technologies, process control, theory of imaging. Courses in medical informatics
are: medical informatics, medical statistics, computers in radiology, physical principles of
modern medical technology, computed tomography, informatics in radiological diagnostics,
informatics in radiotherapy, informatics in radioisotopes technologies, software in
pharmaceutical industry, computer processing of laboratory data, radiological informatics,
computed radiological methods, digital radiology.
2.3
Faculties of mechanical engineering/electrical engineering/computer sciences
In these faculties there is no study program in biomedical engineering/medical informatics.
Courses in biomedical engineering are: biomedical systems, biomechatronics. Course in
medical informatics is telemedicine and medical informatics. We had no available data for all
analyzed faculties in this field.
Most courses are in faculties of medicine/health
studies/pharmacy, and generally fewer courses are in biomedical engineering (Figure 1).
6
30
Number of courses
25
20
15
10
5
0
MED
ENG/COMP
BE
13
3
MI
25
1
Figure 1. Number of courses in biomedical engineering (BE) and medical informatics (MI) in
faculties of medicine/health studies/pharmacy (MED) and faculties of mechanical
engineering/electrical engineering/computer sciences (ENG/COMP)
Number of courses
TOTAL
20
15
10
5
0
MED
ET
COM
ST
TE
VZ
MI
17
1
0
0
0
8
BE
6
2
0
1
0
7
7
TOTAL
MI
BE
37%
63%
Figure2. (A) The number of medical informatics (MI) and biomedical engineering (ME)
courses at the analyzed faculties. (B) The total distribution of at all public universities in
Bosnia and Herzegovina. MED = Medical school, ET = Faculty of electrotechnics, COM =
Computational sciences, ST = Faculty of mechanical engineering. VZ = Faculty of health
sciences.
The list and frequency of courses on bachelor and master level is presented in Figure 3.
Analysis showed that the most common courses in curriculum at the bachelor level are
radiology and medical imaging (Figure 3), while at the master level medical informatics is the
most frequent course (Figure 3). Medical statistics and Software in the pharmaceutical
industry are the less frequent courses in analyzed curricula.
8
Courses Frequency - Bachelor
Courses Frequency
Software in the pharmaceutical industry
0.05
Biomehatronics
0.05
The physical principles of modern medical technology
0.05
Biophysics
0.05
Biomechanics
0.05
Medical Statistics
0.1
Basics of Clinical Diagnosis and Therapy
0.15
Medical informatics
0.15
Navigation and Robotic Systems in Medicine; Computer
Aided Medical Procedures; Computer Assisted Surgery;
0.2
Radiology (CT, MRI, US, ...) / Medical Imaging
0.45
Figure 3. Courses frequency on bachelor level.
Courses Frequency - Master
Courses Frequency
Medical Statistics
0.1
Biomedical system
0.1
Biomechanics
0.1
Biophysics
0.15
Medical informatics
0.35
Figure 4. Courses frequency on master level.
3.
Montenegro
3.1
State of BE and MI education in Montenegro
9
Generally seen, the development of Bioengineering (BE) and Medical Informatics (MI) in
Montenegro went through the following phases:
3.2
•
Rehabilitation engineering.
•
Medical Robotics and Biomechanical systems.
•
Medical Informatics, E-Health and Telemedicine.
•
Medical Electronics and Medical Instrumentation.
•
Educational modules and courses from fields of BE and MI.
Development of the rehabilitation engineering
The Institute for Physical Medicine, Rehabilitation and Rheumatology „Dr Simo Milosevic“
JSC Igalo, founded 1949, is considered to be one of the largest and most famous institutions
for Multidisciplinary SPA treatment on the Balkans, http://www.igalospa.com/en/ . It is a
pioneer of the modern physical and preventive medicine, rehabilitation, thalassotherapy and
wellness, and became one of the leading international centers for rehabilitation of children,
adults and seniors. The Institute’s Physiotherapy College, now the Faculty of Physiotherapy,
was opened in 1976, and turned into the Faculty of Applied Physiotherapy in 2004, which
makes the Institute Igalo a member of the University of Montenegro. All activities related to
the BE and MI targeted to the rehabilitation engineering are related to this Institute and
associated Physiotherapy School (http://www.fpft.ucg.ac.me/o%20fakultetu/).
3.2
Development of Medical Robotics and Biomechanical systems
The development of Robotics and Biomechanics in Montenegro dates from 1975 when the
Laboratory of Robotics under Faculty of Electrical Engineering (www.etf.ac.me ), University
of Montenegro was established in close cooperation with University of Belgrade, former
famous “Belgrade Robotics School”. Additionally to the Medical robotics the research from
biomechanics (gait analyses, sensors biomechanics, etc.) were initiated and performed. The
laboratory was active till end of 90th, completing several projects and publishing numerous
Diploma, MSc and PhD works and scientific papers. Later, to a lesser extent the same
disciplines were studied at Mechanical Engineering Department, University of Montenegro
with emphasis on bone and spine modeling. Today the Laboratory of Robotics is less active.
3.3
Development of MI, E-Health and Telemedicine
In Montenegro telemedical services have begun to develop from 90th. They were reduced
mainly on individualized attempts to transfer the digitized images in pathology between
clinical centers in Serbia and Montenegro in the framework of the project " Telemedicine : the
first telepathology network in Yugoslavia" , in 1998. In addition, there were activities on
digitization and electronic recording images from CT (Computer Tomography) and MRI
(Magnetic Resonance) and their transfer to the local environment of the Clinical Centre in
10
Podgorica using several software tools. Significant achievements in this field are noted in
Teleoncology with close cooperation with Institute of Oncology, Sremska Kamenica, Serbia.
Also, there were special sessions with topics from telemedicine, organized by regional
science conferences that taken a place Montenegro. The main step forward in telemedicine
begun by the pilot project “TeleCG- A PILOT TELEMEDICINE NETWORK OF
MONTENEGRO”,
2004,
implemented
by
Ministry
of
Health
of
Montenegro
(http://www.mzdravlja.gov.me/ministarstvo ) in cooperation with University of Montenegro
(www.ucg.ac.me ). The aim was to link coronary units in the cities of Bar (south) and Berane
(north) with Clinical Centre of Podgorica. Later, Ministry of Health of Montenegro continued
with activities on development of telemedicine supported by International Virtual e-Hospital
Foundation (http://www.iveh.org/ ) and Balkans Telemedicine Programm were active. Also,
the same Ministry organized several seminars with topics from telemedicine.
The Government of Montenegro (www.gov.me ) adopted a variety of laws between 2003 and
2008, aimed at developing a more efficient health care system in accordance with
international legislation and standards. Among these laws and action plans were the
“Strategy for Implementation of ICT in Health Care” (2004), the “Law on Data Collection in
the Field of Health Care System” (2008) and the “Health Development Strategy” (2003).
With the beginning of 2004 Montenegro started to implement modern information systems to
different parts of its health care systems, starting with public pharmacies (2004), the health
insurance funds (2006) and few primary health care institutions (2007). Since 2009 all
primary health care centers in Montenegro completed implementation of primary health care
information system.
The aims and efforts to implement information systems in all segments of health care
fostered the development of several companies dealing with MI in Montenegro, primary
writing the software for health care evidence, finance management and process of
scheduling patients. Some of them are MG-Soft, Cikom, Digit Montenegro.
3.4
Development of Medical Electronics and Medical Instrumentation
The development of Medical Electronics and Medical Instrumentation devices in Montenegro
started by small company EMI Podgorica which custom-designed several instruments for
muscle stimulation. At University of Montenegro the development of this disciplines started
by establishing a Centre for Applied Electronics within Faculty of Electrical Engineering,
2002, www.apeg.ac.me .
From the beginning, the Centre was involved in national and
international projects from BE and MI. Some of them are “Research and Implementation of
Wireless Sensors for the Acquisition of Critical Biosignals”, Greece-Montenegro , bilateral
project,
2006-2008, „New concept in development of Wearable Health Care (WHC)
11
systems“, national project, 2008-2010, „Development and implementation of embedded
systems for medical applications“, 2012.-2015, Apostille FP7 Project. 2011-2014, etc.
Activities of Centre resulted in numerous publications, published at international and national
journals and conferences. Also, numerous Diploma and MSc thesis were completed.
Several prototypes of instruments were designed.
3.5
Educational modules and courses from fields of BE and MI
The above developments and two Tempus projects triggered the development of BE and MI
education in Montenegro. The first project was “Structuring and Complementing Continuous
Education in Medical Informatics”,
TEMPUS CARDS SCM 2005 and the second
“Introduction of new study programme in applied electronics”, TEMPUS CD_40017_2005,
2005-2008. The first project tried to Establishing Continuing Education Center (CEC) in
Podgorica, University of Montenegro and to generate teaching material and infrastructure of
continuing education courses in ICT for medical personnel, starting from the results of CD
JEP 16072-2001 InCo Health.
As a result of the project MI module at University of
Montenegro is developed with emphasis to E-government and E-health. It was a kind of
academic MSc programme which not yet been put into practice. The second project
introduced Spec and MSc studies of Applied Electronics at Faculty of Electrical Engineering,
University of Montenegro, and several courses from BE and MI as “Medical Electronics”,
“Biomedical instrumentation and measurements” and “Identification systems”. In addition to
these courses there are couple of, basically MI oriented, courses in other university units like:
“Medical informatics and statistics” at Nursing College, Berane. “Informatics in medicine” at
School of Medicine, Podgorica, “Informatics in dental medicine” at Department of Dental
Medicine, “Medical informatics” at Department of Dental Medicine, and Doctoral Studies of
Medical School, “Biomedical informatics with elements of health statistics” at Faculty of
applied physiotherapy. There are some elements of BE and MI at “Specialist studies in
radiology” within Medical School of University of Montenegro, but this program is mostly
oriented to health/clinical personnel with emphasis on imaging. Many of methodologies and
techniques applied in MI are taught by several informatics related programmes organized at
state and private universities in Montenegro.
3.6
Summary on BE and MI educational modules in Montenegro and conclusions
The educational modules and courses fully or partially related to the BE and MI in
Montenegro are summarized in Table 1.
Table 3.1. Educational modules and courses from BE and MI in Montenegro
Module
Host institution
Status
Convenient to the
country needs
12
MSc Module in E-
University of Montenegro,
No active
Partially
Government and E-
Faculty of Electrical
Health
Engineering
Spec and MSc in
University of Montenegro,
Active
Partially
Applied Electronics
Faculty of Electrical
Active
No
Active
YES
Active
YES
Nursing College, Berane
Active
YES
University of Montenegro,
Active
YES
Active
YES
Active
YES
Active
YES
Active
Partially
Engineering
Specialist studies from
University of Montenegro,
radiology
Medical School
Courses related to BE
Medical electronics
University of Montenegro,
Faculty of Electrical
Engineering
Biomedical
University of Montenegro,
measurements and
Faculty of Electrical
instrumentation
Engineering
Courses related to MI
Medical informatics and
statistics
Informatics in medicine
Medical School
Informatics in dental
University of Montenegro,
medicine
Medical School, Dental
Medicine Department
Medical informatics
University of Montenegro,
Medical School-Doct.
studies, Dental Medicine
Department
Biomedical informatics
Faculty of applied
with elements of health
physiotherapy
statistics
Identification systems
University of Montenegro,
Faculty of Electrical
Engineering
By analyzing “state of the art” in BE and MI education in Montenegro, as well as summary
given in Table 1, the following conclusions can be derived:
•
There is no convenient active educational program in BE and MI in Montenegro
on BSc, MSc, Spec or PhD levels at state university and private universities.
13
•
There are several courses related to the BE and MI at University of Montenegro: 2
from BE at Faculty of University of Montenegro and 5 from MI at 4 Faculties or
Departments of University of Montenegro (School of medicine, Department of
dental medicine, Faculty of applied physiotherapy and Nursing College).
•
At University of Montenegro, Mediterranean University and University UDG there
are Faculties of information technologies the course of which should be indirectly
related to the MI. Primarily courses from information systems, e-management and
data bases.
•
No infrastructure for the development of BE and MI, expect one laboratory at
Faculty of Electrical Engineering, which only partially satisfied the needs.
•
There is a shortage of personnel for the implementation of the teaching in BE and
MI in Montenegro.
•
The labor market in Montenegro does not recognize BE and MI professions within
its qualification framework.
4.
Serbia
4.1
Introduction
The essence of the numerous definitions of interdisciplinary studies points out the
“combination or involvement of two or more academic disciplines or fields of study”
(http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/interdisciplinary). In more detailed manner it is
“particular branch of learning or body of knowledge such as physics, psychology, or history
..., disciplines that have contrasting substance and syntax, as well as the ways of organizing
themselves and of defining rules for making arguments and claims that others will warrant.
They have different ways of talking about themselves and about the problems, topics, and
issues that constitute their subject matters... Each discipline has its own intellectual history,
agreements, and disputes about subject matter and methods and its own community of
scholars interested in teaching and learning in that field”. Also, the word interdisciplinary itself
points to combined fields of study or specialization, which are derived from two or more, i.e. it
points to the “between fields of study” (Allen Repko: “Interdisciplinary Research: Process and
Theory”,
SAGE
Publications,
Inc,
2008,
http://www.sagepub.com/upmdata/23223_Chapter_1.pdf)
The actual need for involvement of different fields of knowledge for solving complex scientific
and industrial problems, University of Kragujevac (UNIKG, Serbia) recognized more than two
decades ago. However, until 2003 the implementations were restricted to a few courses and
initiatives scattered over various Faculties (study programs) of the University. Among the first
were courses and research initiatives in the broad field of biomedical engineering, followed
by a few other fields of natural, technical and management sciences with strong involvement
of ICT and emerging technologies. University of Kragujevac ran Center of Interdisciplinary
and Multidisciplinary Studies and Research for a several years and organized specialization,
master and PhD level study programs. Nowadays the Centre is closed with the motivation of
applying different organizational and educational modalities. These have strong foundation in
the need to fill a very obvious gap in academic offer and the labor market demands for
interdisciplinary skills. In that course, the intention is to enhance the skills and knowledge
that students from UNIKG get through their degree studies in a range of interdisciplinary
studies, including bioengineering.
14
4.2
Center of Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Studies and Research
Center of Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Studies and Research (CIMSI; in Serbian:
“Centar za interdicisciplinarne i multidisciplinarne studije i istrazivanja”) of the University of
Kragujevac was founded in 2003, and was operational until 2010. Two study programs were
organized:
 Biomedical Engineering;
 Management of the Emerging Technologies.
Study program of Biomedical Engineering offered specializations within following
streams (axes):
 Bioengineering;
 Biomechanics;
 Computational Biomedicine;
 Sports Engineering.
Table 4.1 illustrates the syllabi of the streams:
Table 4.1. Syllabi of the streams for Biomedical Engineering
Biomedical Engineering
Computational
Bioengineering
Biomechanics
Sports Engineering
Biomedicine
Compulsory Courses
Principles of
Computer
Physiology of Sports
Biomedical
Biomechanics
Simulations in
and Sports Medicine
Engineering
Biomedicine
Experiments and
Information
Cardiovascular
Statistics in
Technologies in
Nutrition in Sports
Systems
Biomechanics
Biomedicine
Elective Courses
Principles of
Ultrasound in
Kinesio-mechanics of
Biomedical
MRI
Medicine
Spine
Measurements and
Instrumentation
Biomedical
Orthopedics
Cardiovascular
Image Processing
Instrumentation
Biomechanics
Biomechanics
Biochemical
Biomaterials and
Biomedical
Biomechanics of
Engineering
Artificial Organs
Experiments
Muscles
Cardiovascular
Medical Information Kinesio-mechanics of
Transport Systems
Biomechanics
Systems
Spine
Computational
Kinematics and
MRI
Tissue Biomechanics
Biophysics
Kinetics in Sport
Functional Research
Clinical Computer
Image Processing
Sports Biomechanics
of Cardiovascular
Systems
System
Ergonomics in
Software Engineering
Sports Biomechanics
Anatomy
Biomedicine
in Biomedicine
Computer
Simulations in
Anatomy
Medical Data Bases
Ergonomics in Sport
Biomedicine
Bio-micro-electroDental Biomechanics Artificial Intelligence
Synthesis of
mechanical Systems and Biomaterials
in Biomedicine
Movements
Biomedical
Biomedical
Biomedical
Sports Legislative
Legislative
Legislative
Legislative
Biomedical
Biomedical
Biomedical
Sports Economics
Economics
Economics
Economics
15
Study program of Management of the Emerging Technologies offered specializations within
following streams (axes):
 Engineering Economics;
 Risk Management;
 Agile Production Systems;
 E-Business;
 Integrated Systems of Management;
 Business Process Reengineering;
 Legal Aspects of Management.
Between 2003 and 2010 within study program of Biomedical Engineering two PhD theses
were defended and one specialization degree earned. In the same period within the study
program of Management of the Emerging Technologies four Master of Science these
defended.
4.3
State of the Art
Nowadays at the University of Kragujevac students can take a number of interdisciplinary
courses offered by a variety study programs and specializations. However, these are rarely
organized and systemized within devoted study program(s). Interdisciplinary courses, in
general, are offered by the following faculties:
 Faculty of Engineering;
 Faculty of Technical Sciences;
 Faculty of Sciences and Mathematics;
 Faculty of Economics;
 Faculty of Medical Sciences.
Significant number of courses assumes intensive involvement of bio-medical and
engineering disciplines, where combinations like engineering-medicine, engineering-biology,
physics-biology,
mathematics-physics,
mathematics-biology,
engineering-medicinemathematics and similar appear to be quite common. Moreover, courses that combine ICT
disciplines with aforementioned combinations are the most evident.
The scheme depicted in the Figure 1 shows the state of the art in the variety of the
interdisciplinary courses, in the broad field of biomedical engineering, offered within different
study programs at the University of Kragujevac. The most of those emphasize original area,
as the key interdisciplinary counterpart. In addition, mathematics (various disciplines) and
ICT are other important constituents of these courses.
4.4
The Latest Developments
Recognizing evident trends in educational, scientific, research and market needs some
faculties of University of Kragujevac recently introduced and accredited study programs
(Figure 4.1) that belong to the Interdisciplinary, Multidisciplinary and Transdisciplinary (IMT)
fields according to the standards of Accreditation in Higher Education, issued by Ministry of
Education, Science, and Technological Development of Republic Serbia in 2010. Among
those are the following:
1. Faculty of Engineering
a. Automotive Engineering (bachelor and master levels)
b. Urban Engineering (bachelor level)
c. Military Industrial Engineering (bachelor and master levels; joint
study program with University of Defense, Belgrade, Serbia)
d. Engineering Management (master level)
e. Business Information Systems (master level)
f. Bioengineering (PhD level; joint study program with
University of Defense, Belgrade, Serbia)
16
2. Faculty of Technical Sciences
a. Mechatronics (bachelor and master levels)
b. E-Learning (master level)
c. Studies of Technics and Informatics (integrated)
d. Teaching Mechanical Engineering (master level; study program for
teachers specialization)
e. Teaching Electrical and Computer Engineering (master level; study
program for teachers specialization)
f. ICT
3. Faculty of Sciences and Mathematics
a. Ecology
b. Teaching Physics and Informatics (master level; study program for
teachers specialization)
c. Bioengineering (PhD level; joint study program with
University of Defense, Belgrade, Serbia)
4. Faculty of Medical Sciences
a. Bioengineering (PhD level; joint study
University of Defense, Belgrade, Serbia)
program
Figure 4.1. Current bioengineering-oriented courses at the University of Kragujevac
17
with